Found a Little color Sony, and it is OLD.

[asynchronousman]

You've forgotten that I believe Sony Customer Service is the computerized Antichrist basically, and that most of the product line stinks since 1992. Other than that, the company ran quite well until Mr. Morita passed away and the company was overrun by poor management. 4 years ago I could call a regional service center and talk to somebody in charge who knew what I wanted. I get the same computer telling me to get the "learning remote" and enter the codes for a remote I DON'T HAVE and want to emulate without spending $80 for something that doesn't have all the code routines...fark the Darth Vaio speech recognition that reduces my last name DINIUS to GJFXRQ too.

[Sandy G]

That's a shame- Sony has forgotten what Mr Morita taught-innovative products, generally good quality,second-to-none customer service. Sony stuff was always a little more expensive, but I always felt you got a little more for your money, too. Sony products in the '60s & '70s in my experience, didn't give much trouble, but if they did, you could take 'em into a Sony Authorised Repair Center & they'd be fixed, toot sweet.-Sandy G.

[andy]

http://abcnews.go.com/Business/wireStory?id=427719

It looks like even Sony is finally admitting that they've been having problems recently. I've always thought it was a bad idea for electronics companies to also own music and movie production companies. In the past the electronics companies like Sony fought on the side of the customer for easier access to media (remember Betamax vs Universal?). Now they're in with each other to make the customer pay more and jump through more hoops to listen to music, or watch a movie.

They have been putting profit and market share over innovation for years. They can make more money on junky compact stereos than on high quality, innovative products, but it's gradually turning their name into junk.

[jstout66]

I would have to agree. Sony products I believe into the late 80's were pretty good, but complete overpriced crap now. ALL of their product line.... JUNK! I was stupid enough to buy a 24" Sony Wega set and I returned it in 2 days because the picture was too dark (even with the brightness maxed) and I found out what a high failure/return rate that model had, so there will be no Sony products in my future.

I've heard nothing but problems with late model Sony TVs, but so far have been very fortunate with the Wega flatscreen I bought several years ago. It was a floor model/demonstrator so I guess it proved it's reliability before I bought it. I tend to leave all the TVs I've owned on nearly around the clock when I'm home and sleep with it on so they end up seeing LOTS of hours of use. All my previous Zeniths have lasted about 10 years each and so far this Sony has been a goody.

Anthony

[andy]

I think Sony still makes some good products, but they also make a LOT of crap. Most of Sony's TVs are still pretty good. They made some sets in the mid 90's with cheap CRTs, but they seem to have stopped that.

I hate most of their home audio products though. They are very easily damaged and when a pair of outputs shorts, they take a lot of parts with them. They also have driver ICs which should be attached to a heat sink, but aren't. They get too hot to touch and desolder themselves after a few years.

Needless to say, their all in one systems are real crap.

Am I the only one who finds their current 5.1 receivers really really ugly?

The one consistent thing I hate about Sonys are that there are more confusing buttons on their remote controls than the Space Shuttle has on the instrument panel! Plus the fact that there are components that MUST be replaced with genuine Sony parts or the unit won't work quite right....pretty sneaky, especially considering that these same parts are greatly overpriced compared to the aftermarket version.

Anthony

[andy]

I've actually never had any trouble replacing parts in Sony TVs with parts not ordered from Sony, or even substitutes that have similar specs. I've heard of such problems, but never seen them first hand.

I agree that Sony parts are usually over priced. I just paid almost $30 for an antenna for a KV-5100 5" set I'm restoring. I'm amazed an antenna for a 30 year old TV is still available though! Video heads for their high end Betamax VCRs are also way overpriced. Any 4 head drum will cost well over $200 now and there are no generic subs. On the other hand, I was able to buy a 20" CRT from them for only $35 about 10 years ago.

[asynchronousman]

At the thrift store, I spotted a model KV-1214? (solid state) with horizontal out and showing some sign of the scan beating to the audio (which was excellent). I could think the CRT was OK in that the generally bad scrambling of the picture had enough detail of colors that when I compared it to the video I knew in my mind it looked likely to be good.

If there it's $10. It sat next to a 13" Sharp Linytron with rotary tuning and a great picture so that's bound to cause agony if both are still there.

BTW the Trinitron had a non-standard plug in antenna, not spades or cable/"F"/BNC connectors.

[Chad Hauris]

On the old Trinitrons the rabbitears antenna has a dual banana-plug type plug that fit into the antenna binding posts..it also is nice to have the thumbscrew binding posts for the antenna.

[asynchronousman]

Aye...it's all there and I'll get back to it here or there down the road when it's time to repair it.